Spring Vibes & Hot Crab & Krill

Following a successful start to his spring campaign using Hot Crab & Krill – Jason Mooney reveals the catches he’s had so far putting one of our newest Big Fish boilies to good use…

A new year brings a new spring which if I’m honest is one of my favourite times of year. It consists of new life, new bird calls, longer light hours and of course warmer winds – albeit, very much wetter this year.

After I heard my syndicate water had done a few bites, I thought it was a good time to head back down for some sessions. For my approach, I opted for a new boilie in Hot Crab & Krill and very quickly discovered that it would be my go-to. It’s soft which I like for overnighters as it means it is highly digestible from the off and doesn’t need to be soaked. Couple that with the fishmeal content and amino acids, it contains everything that the carp would be looking for when they wake up from their cold water slumber.

Since its release I have done very well on it alone but I do add a few handfuls of XL Sweetcorn, Peppered Squid and Monster Tiger Nut boilies to the mix just to add some visual attractors. It is a deadly combo and offers you a mixture of hook baits and rigs to choose from which I really like in my fishing.

Anyhow, once the bait decision was sorted, it was down to location at spending the afternoon of my first spring session watching the water trying to track them down. Thankfully, and just like last year, they were in similar areas…

I then felt confident to cast out some ronnies and a wafter rig into the zones where I had seen the fish cruising about in the hope they might have a feed through the hours of darkness. I baited up lightly by walking around to the margins where I had cast my rigs and catapulted some freebies over the top.

To my surprise It did not take long to receive my first bite which was a lovely 27lb mirror that I had already had the pleasure of meeting so just slipped her back after unhooking her. Through the night I heard more fish to my right but sadly I did not receive any more bites but it was a good start. I went to work and was eager to get down again over the next few days.

Upon my return, which was a Friday, I was met with only two other anglers on the lake and to my surprise, one of the swims where I’d heard them boshing a couple of nights before was free so immediately unloaded my gear and went straight to work finding a few spots.

I cast out the same rigs with fresh hooks and Spombed out a mix consisting of the boilies and corn alongside some of the new Frenzied Garlic Hemp to bulk it out.

Nothing happened until the early hours of the morning when my alarm sprung into life at around 4:30am. It was a dogged battle and kited halfway across my swim into some snags. I didn’t give it an inch and just keep steady pressure on until it released itself about five minutes later.

It gave a fantastic account of itself underneath the rod tip, but in the end, she crossed the net cord and I peered into the net thinking to myself – ‘this looks quite big.’

I weighed her and to my surprise, she went over 38lb! It was a very wide and very long fish with not on Mark wrong with her, so I popped round to a friend on the lake and he came round to do some lovely photos before the spot went quiet.

Overall, I thought I had done very well to get two bites in the first two nights of my spring campaign.

When I returned the following week I fancied going into another swim which had similarly features to the previous one I fished only this time, a South Westerly wind was blowing into it. I thought any natural food would be pushing up to there in the tows and currents and it just felt good.

I kept everything the same as I’m a creature of habit and confidence I feel breeds success.

Nothing happened through the night and I thought this might be the first blank overnighter but whilst on the phone to my dad explaining how I thought I might have got it wrong, I heard the classic sound of my Delkim springing into life with a run.

It was a pretty standard battle as I was over the deeper body of the lake which meant I could keep control of it easily.

After getting him in the net I recognised this fish as he was covered in scars and had some stories to tell! At over 30lb and ounces – It was a lovely save to my overnight session.